Xenoblade Chronicles 3 (Switch)

[Skinypupy]

It's been mentioned in a bunch of other topics, but I didn't a dedicated thread for it. Looking forward to jumping into this one next week.

I've enjoyed both of the previous Xenoblade games, although I admit I haven't actually completed either. I've got 60+ hours into each of them and wandered off before finishing...they feel about 1/3 too long for me. Still, they're really solid JRPGs with absolutely incredible worlds.

They released a really good 8 minute overview trailer for XC3 this morning, which walks through a general story overview, combat info, and details on the world. It looks amazing, imo.

[Skinypupy]

Early reviews are excellent, currently sitting at an 89 on Metacritic with 50+ reviews in. Sounds like the story/world/characters are great and the combat has been tweaked to be a bit more approachable as well. All encouraging signs, I think. A little disappointed to hear its between 100-150 hours though, as I think the likelihood of me finishing a game that long is incredibly small.

I'll likely be a couple days behind (currently wrapping up FF XIV Endwalker's MSQ), but will hopefully be able to give it a look later this week.

[Scraper]

Early reviews are excellent, currently sitting at an 89 on Metacritic with 50+ reviews in. Sounds like the story/world/characters are great and the combat has been tweaked to be a bit more approachable as well. All encouraging signs, I think. A little disappointed to hear its between 100-150 hours though, as I think the likelihood of me finishing a game that long is incredibly small.

I'll likely be a couple days behind (currently wrapping up FF XIV Endwalker's MSQ), but will hopefully be able to give it a look later this week.

It looks good. I really enjoyed XC2 so this one seems like a no brainer. One thing I did see in a couple of the reviews is that the graphics are ok, but the Switch hardware is really starting to show its age with pop ins and textures. I really hope Nintendo announces a Switch follow up soon. And that they follow in Microsoft and Sony's footsteps and make it backwards compatible to the Switch.

[Zaxxon]

Looks good. I liked XC2 but fizzled out a couple dozen hours in. Loved XC Definitive but also fizzled. The reviews make it sound as though Monolithsoft really learned from each of the prior iterations and streamlined a lot.

I'll def pick this up once I finish Octopath.

[Madmarcus]

Every time I hear about the games in this series I think about whether they are playable via emulation on a PC. Yet somehow I've never tried to do it.

[Scraper]

I ordered this online over the weekend. I'll post some impressions once it gets here and I fire it up. Like many I've played both 1 and 2. I beat part 2 and really enjoyed it, but could never make it to the end of part 1, the middle part of that game just drags for me.

[rittchard]

I played this a few times over the weekend, both on handheld and on big screen. I enjoyed the combat and it seemed promising, things moved along at a nice brisk pace and kind of jumped you right in to the action. But for whatever reason, I actually fell asleep twice while playing... (see the Rittchard effect in TV shows). Now I don’t want that to be the sum total of my impressions because I honestly enjoyed much of what I saw. I think it did become a bit repetitive, though, and I suspect I’m still only in the prologue or very early part of the game. But it just felt like the team (which changes a couple times) just kept running around in circles around the same spots and fighting slightly harder versions of stuff. I don’t mind this kind of gameplay in general but I just got an odd feeling like I was constantly waiting for something major to happen to start the “real” game. Anyway, I need to give it some more time I think. They’ve introduced quite a few characters, and some of them are good but some of their voice lines can be grating after the 20th time.

So short version is I’m not quite sure what to make of the game yet.

[Skinypupy]

I played this a few times over the weekend, both on handheld and on big screen. I enjoyed the combat and it seemed promising, things moved along at a nice brisk pace and kind of jumped you right in to the action. But for whatever reason, I actually fell asleep twice while playing... (see the Rittchard effect in TV shows). Now I don’t want that to be the sum total of my impressions because I honestly enjoyed much of what I saw. I think it did become a bit repetitive, though, and I suspect I’m still only in the prologue or very early part of the game. But it just felt like the team (which changes a couple times) just kept running around in circles around the same spots and fighting slightly harder versions of stuff. I don’t mind this kind of gameplay in general but I just got an odd feeling like I was constantly waiting for something major to happen to start the “real” game. Anyway, I need to give it some more time I think. They’ve introduced quite a few characters, and some of them are good but some of their voice lines can be grating after the 20th time.

So short version is I’m not quite sure what to make of the game yet.

Have you played the previous Xenoblade games? This is kinda how they all roll…very slowly in general.

I’ll be jumping in tonight. Took me a bit longer to wrap up FF XIV than I expected.

[Zaxxon]

I am disappointed to hear that repetitive combat exclamations is still a thing. For a AAA series designed around dozens of hours of combat using a core group of characters, there should be 100 unique shouts for each character, not 5 or whatever the real # is.

[Skinypupy]

I'm about 8 hours in and am not really sure what to think. On the one hand, the world is absolutely beautiful, the voice work is stellar, the story is pretty interesting, and the music is superb (if this is in fact Yasunori Mitsuda's swan song, as rumored, he's going out on a massive high note).

On the other hand, it just really hasn't clicked yet for a couple of glaring reasons:

1. Everything other than simply beelining straight from one objective to the next just feels very unfocused, disjointed, and kinda random. You're running around large areas, picking up a thousand random sparkly doo-dads of unclear purpose off the ground with no idea what they do. Sometimes mobs will become hostile and attack, other times you can run right by them with no reaction. You can go from a level 15 to level 75 mobs within 10 yards and have to keep your head on a swivel to ensure you're not aggroing something that can one-shot you. There's a hundred different CP/TP/XP/Damage/Gold numbers flashing around during combat, along with a mess of lines, aggro markers, and AOE effects all while all six party members are constantly shouting random comments. It's all just a lot, and I don't really understand most of it. Which leads to the next issue...

2. The game likes to dump huge, complex systems on you with barely the most cursory explanation. There's a class system, skill system, arts system, ability system, alignment system, affinity system, fusion system, TP system, gem crafting system, cooking system…the list feels endless. I understand how they work at a very basic and surface level (from the 3 sentence text dump), but that's about it. I really have no idea if or how I should be leveling or advancing my characters and feel like I'm just randomly gaining...stuff. Like, I know my characters are getting more powerful simply by battling mobs, but I honestly have no idea if there's something I should be doing/assigning/paying attention to that would be 5X more effective because I can't make heads nor

My hope is that if I can start to make sense of the bazillion different systems and how they all work together, that'll be the point the game clicks and makes sense. I've been trying not to judge it too harshly based on the first few hours (this is a 100+ hour JRPG, after all), but my first impressions have mostly been...confusion.

[Scraper]

I've only been able to put about 3 hours into it so far. My initial impressions:

1. The game world does look great, somehow the cell shaded characters look good with the more realistic looking environment. Also, I haven't found the environmental pop-in to be as bad as some reviewers suggest. This game is up there with the best looking games on the Switch.

2. I swear the voice actors are all the same as the ones from XBC 1.

3. The one liners by the characters repeat WAY WAY WAY to often. They will literally say the same lines repeatedly throughout battles. It is very amateurish for a game that should be AAA quality. If this keeps up for 100 hours I will mute the voices.

4. The Story and Gameworld are both really interesting so far.

5. The battle system is pure Xenoblade Chronicles so far, which is kind of a let down after playing more action focused JRPGS like the FF7 remake and the Tales series. But if you enjoyed combat in XBC1 and 2 then you will feel right at home with 3.

[Scraper]

I'm about 8 hours in now and man does this game throw a ton of systems at you in the first 8 hours. BUT I still don't feel overwhelmed by any of them. Personally I don't like RPGs where you can freely switch the classes of each character, I prefer to stick with one class for each character, but that's a small complaint.

As for the graphics, I can say your mileage may vary depending on the size of your TV. I stand by my initial impressions when playing on a smaller TV, I first played this on a 50inch 1080p TV and it looked great. Then I played it on my 108 inch projector and the graphical weaknesses became really apparent (this is my preferred screen for my PS5 and Series X). The short draw distance and last gen textures were really noticeable at this size. So I intend to mostly play the game on the 50 inch or via handheld mode.

The story continues to be a highlight for me at this point and I see no reason why that should change. For me the story is one of the most important parts of a JRPG. It also helps that the production values when it comes to story telling are top notch.

[Octavious]

I played handheld and on my 1440p 32 inch monitor. I vastly enjoyed handheld more. To me it looks a lot better. On a bigger screen the dated visuals stick out. I have had zero time to play it this week. Plan on diving in today/tomorrow as thing are finally calming down.

[Skinypupy]

Well, it look longer than I was hoping, but this game finally clicked - in a big way - around the 10 hour mark. I'm not even sure what happened, but everything suddenly came into focus and now I just can't stop playing. The class system makes sense, the leveling makes sense, the Colony rank makes sense, the different combat arrows and prompts make sense, the quest system makes sense...it has all just come together with some really amazing synergy.

There's still a couple minor nitpicks and things that confuse me though:
- There's a small meter that fills as you gain Class Points (CP), but there aren't any numbers on it (i.e. 15/200). So if I get 25 CP from a battle, does that get me 1% of the way to the next level or 10%? It's still a bit of guesswork.
- I'm still unclear on how additional jobs are unlocked by other characters. The quick tutorial said that they progress towards unlock by having someone else in the party playing as that class. But it seems that some unlock really slowly and others very quickly. I'm not sure what's influencing that.
- There's been a few times when I've "sent" big groups of soldiers for lots of points, but it didn't appear to link those points to a specific colony. Is it because I haven't found it yet? If so, will those points be applied when I do find it? Or did I just completely waste 200 points by "sending" that group?

I'm just around 20 hours now. My biggest problem is that I've been enjoying exploring and side questing so much, that I'm way overleveled for the main story. MSQ is level 17...I'm at level 34. I'm just running through most areas without ever bothering with the mobs unless I happen to draw aggro, which has been rare because everything is 10+ levels below me. I'm sure that'll change as I progress the story.

The music here deserves another mention, as it's truly wonderful. Best game soundtrack I've heard in a long, long time.

For anyone who struggles at the beginning like I did, I would strongly recommend that you play at least until you unlock and finish the first Hero quest and start unlocking additional classes. That opens up the game SO much, and it really starts coming into it's own. This one is definitely a slow starter, but I'm thoroughly enjoying it now.

[Scraper]

I'm in almost at the exact same spot as Skinnypup and I am also over-leveled. After I freed the colony with the Engineer Hero I went and did side quests. I freed 2 other colonies and did as many of their side quests as I could. That resulted in me being around lvl 30 when I went back and resumed lvl 17 main quest stuff. The good thing is that the mobs tend not to aggro you if you're +5 levels above them. So for the most part you can run past them and progress the story.

Probably my biggest gripe with this game so far is the amount of characters and enemies in each battle. At times there are so many characters on the screen that it becomes almost impossible to tell what's going on in a battle. I usually just end up staring at my action timers just like an MMO.

[Scraper]

Also, the game really does hit it's stride around the 15 to 20 hour mark. The storyline stays interesting and just when you think you have the overall gist figured out they drop even more hints and clues as to what exactly is going on. If it's anything like XB2 then there will be a big reveal/curve at the end.

[Scraper]

I just hit lvl 40. I would say I'm a little less than 30 hours in and I'm still really enjoying this one. I am still way over leveled for the main quest stuff. I think you could probably run straight through this game doing only required quests and not have to grind. The thing is the side quest stuff is all pretty good and you would miss nice storyline filler and character development moments if you only did main quest stuff.

[Octavious]

I have had zero time to play this for more than a few minutes so I'm waiting until things quite down a bit. Usually summer is quite, but this year has just been nuts. From what I saw it was a good combination of 1 and 2. I just need to find some darn time.

[Skinypupy]

I just hit lvl 40. I would say I'm a little less than 30 hours in and I'm still really enjoying this one. I am still way over leveled for the main quest stuff. I think you could probably run straight through this game doing only required quests and not have to grind. The thing is the side quest stuff is all pretty good and you would miss nice storyline filler and character development moments if you only did main quest stuff.

We're about on the same pace. I'm at 43 at around 30 hours. It's got it's hooks into me more than any game has had in a while. Really excellent world, characters, story, music, and combat.

Took a while to get going, but it's a blast now.

[Scraper]

FYI, I don't know if I missed this during a tutorial or if the game just does a bad job of explaining it, BUT you can spend silver Nappon coins to upgrade class levels. This is really helpful when it comes to classes I hate playing (Literally any defender class).

[Skinypupy]

I just hit what I assume it the midway point at around 50 hours in. This is usually about the time I start to wander, but I'm absolutely riveted to this game. It just keeps getting better and better the further I get. The overarching story is interesting, but the individual character interactions are so incredibly well-written and bring so much personality to the game. You know how every party-based JRPG has that one throwaway character who you never bother with because they're annoying or bland. Not so here...I adore every one of these characters. They all start off as somewhat tropey (the stalwart hero, the smart-ass, the strong fighter, the techie, etc.) but are fully developed in truly satisfying ways.

The sequence at the end of Chapter 5 is, without exaggeration, one of the greatest sequences I've ever seen in a JRPG. It brings together multiple storylines, ties them in a massive emotional knot (quite literally brought me to tears...no joke), then flips the entire story up to that point completely on it's head. It's absolutely brilliant.

The only problem is that it's a nearly 2-hour series of cutscenes and boss battles with only one save point dropped in the middle. I happened to be in a spot where I had the time to get all the way through it, but it would have been really frustrating had I not been. A little warning ("You're about to do a really long sequence. Please be sure to set aside enough time.") would have been nice.

[Scraper]

I just hit what I assume it the midway point at around 50 hours in. This is usually about the time I start to wander, but I'm absolutely riveted to this game. It just keeps getting better and better the further I get. The overarching story is interesting, but the individual character interactions are so incredibly well-written and bring so much personality to the game. You know how every party-based JRPG has that one throwaway character who you never bother with because they're annoying or bland. Not so here...I adore every one of these characters. They all start off as somewhat tropey (the stalwart hero, the smart-ass, the strong fighter, the techie, etc.) but are fully developed in truly satisfying ways.

The sequence at the end of Chapter 5 is, without exaggeration, one of the greatest sequences I've ever seen in a JRPG. It brings together multiple storylines, ties them in a massive emotional knot (quite literally brought me to tears...no joke), then flips the entire story up to that point completely on it's head. It's absolutely brilliant.

The only problem is that it's a nearly 2-hour series of cutscenes and boss battles with only one save point dropped in the middle. I happened to be in a spot where I had the time to get all the way through it, but it would have been really frustrating had I not been. A little warning ("You're about to do a really long sequence. Please be sure to set aside enough time.") would have been nice.

Spoiler:

I think I hit that spot this morning. The Jail Break scene? I got about 30 minutes into it and had to leave, so I put the console on sleep mode, hopefully nothing happens to it before I can get back to it. I paused it where M is using her mind control powers on the team.

[Skinypupy]

I just hit what I assume it the midway point at around 50 hours in. This is usually about the time I start to wander, but I'm absolutely riveted to this game. It just keeps getting better and better the further I get. The overarching story is interesting, but the individual character interactions are so incredibly well-written and bring so much personality to the game. You know how every party-based JRPG has that one throwaway character who you never bother with because they're annoying or bland. Not so here...I adore every one of these characters. They all start off as somewhat tropey (the stalwart hero, the smart-ass, the strong fighter, the techie, etc.) but are fully developed in truly satisfying ways.

The sequence at the end of Chapter 5 is, without exaggeration, one of the greatest sequences I've ever seen in a JRPG. It brings together multiple storylines, ties them in a massive emotional knot (quite literally brought me to tears...no joke), then flips the entire story up to that point completely on it's head. It's absolutely brilliant.

The only problem is that it's a nearly 2-hour series of cutscenes and boss battles with only one save point dropped in the middle. I happened to be in a spot where I had the time to get all the way through it, but it would have been really frustrating had I not been. A little warning ("You're about to do a really long sequence. Please be sure to set aside enough time.") would have been nice.

Spoiler:

I think I hit that spot this morning. The Jail Break scene? I got about 30 minutes into it and had to leave, so I put the console on sleep mode, hopefully nothing happens to it before I can get back to it. I paused it where M is using her mind control powers on the team.

It starts after that.

But damn, that bit was so cool.

[Skinypupy]

Finished this tonight with characters at level 79, just a touch over 65 hours. Could have easily spent another 50 doing side quests, hero quests, and unlocking all the classes, but I was ready to move on by the time the credits rolled. A really excellent game overall with a great, bittersweet ending. Definitely one of the better JRPG's I've played, and probably the strongest on the Switch. It's also the first "Xeno" series game I've beaten since Xenosaga 2 way back in 2004.

It struck the perfect balance of exploring a vibrant world, telling an engaging story (even though it did veer a bit into anime nonsense land towards the end), fantastic characters, stellar voice work, a fun combat system that you could make as complex or simple as you'd like, amazing music (seriously...amazing), and just a very solid overall package.

My only two gripes would be that it starts slow without doing a great job introducing systems, and the final area is a real letdown. After spending 60+ hours exploring really interesting worlds with lots to do and having the story seemingly headed for a thrilling climax, the final area basically locks you into slogging through a boring 4-5 hour hallway with unavoidable trash mobs every 30 seconds. That is then followed by your typical JRPG "fight the boss 6 times in increasingly more powerful forms" final encounter. It was a pretty significant letdown, but was saved by a really fantastic close after the final boss went down.

7/8 tentacles, excellent game

[Scraper]

Finished this tonight with characters at level 79, just a touch over 65 hours. Could have easily spent another 50 doing side quests, hero quests, and unlocking all the classes, but I was ready to move on by the time the credits rolled. A really excellent game overall with a great, bittersweet ending. Definitely one of the better JRPG's I've played, and probably the strongest on the Switch. It's also the first "Xeno" series game I've beaten since Xenosaga 2 way back in 2004.

It struck the perfect balance of exploring a vibrant world, telling an engaging story (even though it did veer a bit into anime nonsense land towards the end), fantastic characters, stellar voice work, a fun combat system that you could make as complex or simple as you'd like, amazing music (seriously...amazing), and just a very solid overall package.

My only two gripes would be that it starts slow without doing a great job introducing systems, and the final area is a real letdown. After spending 60+ hours exploring really interesting worlds with lots to do and having the story seemingly headed for a thrilling climax, the final area basically locks you into slogging through a boring 4-5 hour hallway with unavoidable trash mobs every 30 seconds. That is then followed by your typical JRPG "fight the boss 6 times in increasingly more powerful forms" final encounter. It was a pretty significant letdown, but was saved by a really fantastic close after the final boss went down.

7/8 tentacles, excellent game

I'm very close to the end as well and like you I'm ready to move on so I stopped doing side missions and I'm just plowing through the storyline at this point (I got to the part where the Nappon warns you and says "Are you sure you want to proceed, wink, wink you have other optional stuff to wrap up" or something to that affect).

[Skinypupy]

I'm very close to the end as well and like you I'm ready to move on so I stopped doing side missions and I'm just plowing through the storyline at this point (I got to the part where the Nappon warns you and says "Are you sure you want to proceed, wink, wink you have other optional stuff to wrap up" or something to that affect).

Push through the final dungeon slog. The ending payoff is worth it.

[Scraper]

I'm very close to the end as well and like you I'm ready to move on so I stopped doing side missions and I'm just plowing through the storyline at this point (I got to the part where the Nappon warns you and says "Are you sure you want to proceed, wink, wink you have other optional stuff to wrap up" or something to that affect).

Push through the final dungeon slog. The ending payoff is worth it.

I'll definitely finish it, I really like the game. I'm just at the point where I can't justify finishing all my side quests. I do have about half of my heroes/characters side quests done so a good bit of them can hit level 20 on their class, I figure that's good enough to finish the game off.

[Skinypupy]

The final boss is level 75, if that helps.

[Scraper]

I finished this up last night with my party at level 75. I agree with Skinnyp, the game is really good, but the last area is 3 hours of hallway filler and I didn't count but the final boss may have actually had more than 6 forms/battles to get through. The end was really good though and the rest of the game is top notch. I will say the repetitive one liners do get better once you get your full party, but they're still an issue. Also for anyone else who has beaten this I have a question:

Spoiler:

During the end scenes they show one of the Queen's looking at a bunch of people, are those the characters from a prior game? It's been so long since I played XBC2 that I can't place them.